Rainbow In The Dark
by Naitachal666
Summary: An unlikely series of events brings two from a point of at odds to closer than they've ever been before. Now, it's up to Ichigo to maintain that fragile bond.


And welcome to another strangely confusing, yet oddly addicting fanfiction by myself. Again, I have outwitted myself and created another story that is going to force me to the ends of my intellect in order to complete. At least I've been able to write a few chapters. After all, I'm updating more frequently than I have in a while.

Disclaimer: I do NOT own Bleach or any of its characters. They are liscenced to Tite Kubo, VIZ media, and Shonen Jump magazine. Neither do I own the song _Rainbow in the Dark_ by Ronnie James Dio (the original creater of the song _Holy Diver_).

Yaoi? Yes, please!

**HichiIchiHichiIchi**

Rainbow In The Dark

_When there's lightning -you know it always brings me down  
Cause it's free and I see that it's me  
Who's lost and never found  
I cry for out magic - I feel it dancing in the light _

I felt Ichigo gasp as I brushed the top of his mind almost gently. He had gotten so used to my brutal leaps for control that he couldn't ever remember if there had been any other type of confrontation with me. Ironically, neither could I. Chuckling softly, I reached a little further and sensed his consternation grow. I knew that it would soon turn to anger, and that I had to act before he could raise his fury to a tempest. Pushing the laughter from my voice, I opened my mind to him and tried for a calm but serious tone.

_:King: _I knew I had his attention when his weary mind turned to mine. He was annoyed, but not angry yet. A good sign. _:You should get up while they're not looking. Hide.:_ I recognized my King's surprise underlying the bone-deep weariness that settled over him. I knew when he started to open his mouth to speak out loud and rushed to stop him.

_:King!:_ My mental shout rocked him long enough for me to explain quickly. _:Not out loud! Don't you know? They can hear you. Speak like _this I gathered he understood me when his mouth closed and he opened his mind towards me.

/Like this?/ It was a cautious voice, and a very tired one.

_:Exactly, King.:_ I took a moment to push a wave of ensuring satisfaction at him, the way Zangetsu often did. _:I can hide our reitsu and give you enough energy to escape.:_

/Why?/ My King's mind voice was a mess of exhaustion, pain and a quiet curiosity. I mulled my response over in my mind like Zangetsu had often told me to. It would not do to say something rash to my King when I needed him to trust me for both our sakes.

_:Because you are my King, I will not let you be taken so easily by another:_ I whispered to him, letting my words float softly into his head with the certainty that he would not take offense. I felt more than sensed his agreement, a shock of tingling resolve all over me. _:Good.:_

I let my power wash into him carefully, draining away for the moment the exhaustion that plagued him without letting the Arrancar notice the increase in his reitsu.

_:NOW!:_

/NOW!/

Ichigo shot to his feet and grabbed the unconscious body of his friend. Not a moment after he had the redheaded shinigami secure in his arms, Ichigo used shunpo to speed his steps as far away as he could with my power. The distance we covered in that single bound was tremendous. It barely appeared to be a handful of steps before we reached the gate. A single captain and part of his squad manned the gate. I recognized him through my King's eyes. I had fought him once, before my King took over and banished me back to the darkness. I pushed down a wave of discontent that arose at the thought and focused solely on keeping my King on his feet.

The captain's eyes widened when Ichigo came to a stop in front of him, gasping and bloodied.

"Activate the gate, Byakuya! Get everyone out of here!" Ichigo commanded, giving himself a moment to rest crouched over the ground and Renji. "There're still Espada left over, and there are unranked Arrancar almost as strong! Move!" My, my. King was being pushy. I was almost as surprised as he was, however, when the captain sent out the retreat signal and turned to open the gate. As soon as it was open, shinigami poured through the opening and into the dangai waiting beyond, their hell butterflies leading them unerringly back to Soul Society.

Hovering at the top of King's mind, I gave him another burst of reitsu when he stumbled upon standing. He recovered quickly, throwing his injured friend over his good shoulder and dashing through the portal with the captain right behind him. When the opening closed soundly, all the shinigami still remaining in the dangai slowed down to a sedate jog, entering Seireitei and slowing to a walk.

Ichigo had barely laid Renji down on the ground before he lost his hold on the power I was feeding him, collapsing sideways over the shinigami's chest. Then, the darkness came and swallowed us both into the ever pouring rain.

_It was cold - I lost my hold  
To the shadows of the night  
_

**HichiIchiHichiIchi**

_There's no sign of the morning coming  
You've been left on your own  
Like a Rainbow in the Dark_

I doubt King knew that he was floating in our thundering sky. Zangetsu and I stood atop the highest building watching him. We were drenched, cold rain dripping from my nose and trailing little paths over my wet skin. The most either of us could do was try to keep the water from our eyes as we stared upwards. It was interesting, how the dark clouds and the lightening skittered just around his body. Somehow, I got the impression that although it moved away from him, it was still raining on my King. Turning my head to Zangetsu, I tried to read his eyes through those damned shades of his. Sometimes in a particularly bright flash from the brewing sky I could catch a glimpse of his sober hazel eyes. Their expression was distant yet extremely focused. I wonder what he is thinking and if it has anything to do with what was wrong with King.

As I thought about it, a spot opened up in the sky and the sunlight shone through. It was almost beautiful to my hollow eyes, but what captured my concentration the most was the smile on Zangetsu's sharp face. I stared openly, my glittering eyes filled with wonderment. I had never seen the old man smile in such a way before, and it gave a whole new meaning to his words when he had pledged Ichigo that he would do anything in his power to make the rain stop. As the golden sunlight washed over us and King disappeared from the sky, I allowed myself the slightest of grins. The darkness and storms were just a little ways off and would soon be back, but for a few minutes at least, the rain had stopped.

**HichiIchiHichiIchi**

Ichigo felt the headache before anything else, and it was that aching pounding that brought him into wakefulness. He blinked his gritty eyes a few times and opened them to stare at the ceiling of one of the fourth division's recuperation rooms. Sighing deeply, the carrot top rolled over and snuggled his face into the pillow. Almost immediately afterwards, he heard his hollow's voice in his head.

_:Oi, King. Me 'n Zangetsu are glad you're feelin' better.:_ The disconnected voice sounded almost _bubbly._ It was unnerving.

/What are you so happy about?/ Ichigo asked his hollow, irritation evident. Amusement drifted up from the depths of his mind before the hollow responded.

_:Just 'bout how its not rainin' for once, aibou. Shoulda seen the old man. Smilin' and all that rot.:_ The hollow was practically laughing at the last part, but it was more genuine than his usual mocking laughter.

/Smiling?/ Ichigo's mind voice was laced with hesitant disbelief.

_:Yeah, aibou. Wouldn'a believed it if I hadn'a seen it myself. So, ya gonna get outta bed before they kick ya out of it, King?:_ The hollow laughed heartily, his high-pitched voice not _quite_ grating on the ears. Although, the hollow had a point; Ichigo could feel Unohana-taichou's reitsu approaching down the hallway.

Rolling back over, Ichigo growled softly and sat up just as the shoji door slid open. His brown eyes met the woman's briefly before glancing away to the wall. He knew that she would ask many uncomfortable questions that he wouldn't have answers for. Or that he couldn't safely answer. It was a paradox, really. Few of the other shinigami knew about Ichigo's Vaizard abilities, and the rest didn't need to know. And to top it off, he could hear his hollow scrambling about in his head. The noise was distracting to the substitute Shinigami, causing his ears to ring when the hollow seemed to break something with a triumphant shout. It only fueled Ichigo's darkening mood.

_:Oi, aibou!:_ It was suspiciously shouted over tinkling shards, and Ichigo began to question what exactly his hollow was doing in there. _:'Cha know, there's a lot of stuff in here that doesn't take a liking to me. Like that lightening ya keep throwin' around. Gonna hurt somebody, King!:_

/Lightening?, Ichigo thought irritably as the taicho laid a hand on his forehead to check his temperature. When she lifted it away to write down her findings, Ichigo took the time to shake his hair back into place, although he wished he hadn't when it sent a stabbing pain through his skull. Holding his head in between his hands, Ichigo sent a simmering glare at the far wall. Seconds later, there was a yelp from inside his head.

As the seconds passed, Ichigo became more and more immersed in the volatile thoughts revolving in his mind, about how things were just going from bad to worse, especially now that he was almost drained of reitsu and stuck in the infirmary while there was still work to be done. If one had been paying attention to his eyes, one would have noticed how the normally warm brown pupils were livid and black from anger.

_:King! Stoppit!: _The hollow's angry shriek seemed to resound from every surface in Ichigo's head, amplifying with every reverberation. "_Yer gonna _kill_ me! Zan!:_

Suddenly, Ichigo recognized the pressure of invisible hands on his shoulders, and his entire world went black. A second later, his eyes opened to utter chaos as lightening crackled dangerously in the sky and brooding clouds threatened a drenching that might wash him away. Before Ichigo's startled eyes could adjust to the abrupt tilt in scenery related to appearing in his inner world, a deep rumbling like that of an earthquake broke the eerie half-silence and a bolt of brilliant white blinded him at the same time that his world seemed to dissolve into an earth shattering roar. Dazzled eyes staring at halos of nothing and his ears ringing painfully, Ichigo was barely aware of a warm body pressed against his as their hearts pounded in a staccato beat from adrenaline. Faintly, he could hear someone calling him, and another, fainter cry, demanding his attention.

Numbly, Ichigo turned towards where he thought the voices were coming from and squinted. Already, his vision was returning from the fierce light that had blinded him. Barely, he could make out Zangetsu's face staring with mixed concern and anger. Behind the man, a washed out figure was glaring angrily. Frowning, Ichigo glanced back up at the sky and noticed that while the most prominent lightning and thunder had stopped, the maelstrom had yet to cease.

"Ichigo, I know that you are distressed, but you _must _stop this Calm yourself and concentrate on clearing your mind. Do not let this eat at you." Zangetsu's calm advice delivered in a stern tone did half of the work for him, allowing Ichigo to center his thoughts. Slowly, the storm clouds began to clear away. The redhead opened his eyes tentatively after a few minutes, and relaxed when the darkness continued to roll away. He startled, however, when his hollow collapsed bonelessly at his side. Glancing at the other, Ichigo let out a brief sound of shock. The hollow's shihakusho was scorched and torn, and there were black burns marring the white flesh. Parts of his bleached hair were crisped almost to his scalp, and a ragged burn took up almost the entirety of the right side of his face. Blood dribbled and foamed from between parted lips as the hollow gasped for breath around his bitten tongue, occasionally opening his mouth wide to clear the blood more effectively. It was more than obvious that the hollow was exhausted.

"Shirosaki will heal. Slower than normal, perhaps." Zangetsu's voice startled Ichigo into glancing up.

"Huh?" Was Ichigo's ever intelligent reply.

"The hollow. His name is Shirosaki." Zangetsu's words held a sigh somewhere within their syllables. Ichigo wasn't sure whether the sigh was because he hadn't known Shirosaki's name, or simply because the situation at hand.

Leaving that thought to later, Ichigo turned back to his wounded hollow. As he brought his eyes back to Shirosaki's face, the hollow rolled his head just enough for his half-lidded golden eyes to meet Ichigo's brown ones. The bloody grin the hollow attempted was heartening somehow, even if directly after, it turned into a pained grimace.

Ichigo had the feeling that Shirosaki wanted to say something, but was in too much pain to speak. Realizing that his mind was closed to the hollow, Ichigo opened his mind towards him and got a wordless sense of approval from both spirits of his zanpoku-to.

"Shirosaki?" The tentative word fell into the awkward silence as a stone would into a pond.

_:You are too kind, Ichigo.: _Fatigue laced the hollow's voice, but the good-humored sarcasm in the first part was apparent. _:I suggest you leave the black anger and evil feelings to me, next time. But really, I appreciate the concern.:_ The corner of Shirosaki's mouth twitched upward into the only semblance of a smile the hollow could allow himself at the moment, but what surprised Ichigo the most was the complete honesty of the remark. It was as if by opening their minds to each other, no lies could be told between them. Once the connection was lost though, Ichigo assumed, that ability would be lost as well.

Tentatively, the redhead let a hesitant smile touch his lips, one that broadened when Shirosaki pushed a mental smile at him. Both of them were unaccustomed to this newfound camaraderie, but neither felt like pressing the issue.

"As I said, Ichigo, Shirosaki will heal. You need to return to the outside world before the taichou gets restless from your prolonged absence." Again, Zangetsu's voice had the privilege of breaking Ichigo's thoughts. "Go."

Nodding to Zangetsu, and then on second thought to Shirosaki as well, Ichigo let himself revert back to Soul Society. During the transition from plane to plane, he thought that he heard Shirosaki voice a very faint '_:G'bye, king:' _in his head.

When Ichigo appeared back on his cot in the infirmary, Unohana-taichou was sitting cross-legged beside him as if she had been waiting for his return. Her expression did not bode well, and Ichigo could only smile falteringly and duck his head.

"Kurosaki Ichigo, why do you suddenly grow angry as a mountain storm, before vanishing at the hands of your Zanpoku-to?"

"…Err…." _Oh shit._


End file.
